HUNTSVILLE, Alabama -- "It almost feels like you're playing the air," Hymn for Her's
Lucy Tight says of playing her cigar box
guitar. "I love how light it is.And we don't need a bass player or a lead guitar
player, because it brings out the fatness and covers it all."

Artists using cigar box guitars tend to be bluesy. Philadelphia-based
duo Hymn for Her has dashes of that, but their sound also boasts chunks of pop, punk and rock, as well as trippy lyrical content. Take "Mojave," the opening track to their new album "Lucy & Wayne's
Smoking Flames," for example.

"We were driving, touring, through the Nevada desert," says
Hymn for Her drummer Wayne Waxing of the inspiration for "Mojave." "And I was
just trying to stay awake and following these three cars in front of me as they're
snaking through the canyons. The six taillights looked like this weird flock of
night birds with red eyes, and I just started telling Lucy, 'Let's get these
weird desert scenes down.' And then I saw the sign for Mojave and that sounded
like a cool name for the chorus."

On May 31, Hymn for Her will open the Ninth Annual Cigar Box
Festival with a free 6-9 p.m. Concerts on the Dock set at Lowe Mill (2211
Seminole Drive). On a recent afternoon, Hymn for Her members were driving their Ford
Triton (which has over 360,000 miles on it, and "and we put all those miles on
it," Wayne says) past Asheville, N.C., when they were called for this interview.

What have you been listening to out on the road today?

Lucy: Today, I had Pandora set and we heard some Ray
Charles, some Broken Family Band, The Kinks. We heard CSN (Crosby, Stills &
Nash). And then we looked up the story for "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes" and that was
very interesting.

What do you think your cigar box guitar adds to the Hymn for
Her sound?

Lucy: It has a really nice, distorted sound that works good with the punk-ish feel. Very raw and organic.

What did you like about working with former White Stripes producer
Jim Diamond on "Smokin Flames"?

Lucy: We liked that he really got down to business, and was
fast and easy to work with, and he could work a long chunk of hours without his
ears getting frazzled. And he's very used to analog.

Which piece of analog gear at Diamond's Ghetto Recorders
studio in Detroit was particularly helpful in making the LP?

Wayne: (Diamond) had some great tube amps; we ran the cigar box's
bass string through an old Ampeg bass amp, and I think the guitar strings through an
old Fender Twin Reverb.

Hymn for Her covers the Led Zeppelin tune "Bron-Y-Aur
Stomp." There are a lot of well-known, slide-guitar rock tracks to cover. Why'd
you pick that one?

Lucy: Wayne and I are both Zeppelin fans and that's always
been one of our favorite Zeppelin songs.

Wayne: That song sounds great in particular with how we do
things. I play kick and hi-hat, which is what John Bonham does in that song. I
think even John Paul Jones is playing a slide on the bass, or it sounds like
it. It has great lyrics about the country and it's also about Robert Plant's
dog. And it reminds us of our dog that passed away so we just love singing it. People
go crazy when we start playing it.

You and Lucy are a couple, right?

Wayne: We are a couple. A couple of what I don't know.

What's the story behind your stage names?

Lucy: We changed our names legally, so those are no longer
stage names; those are our names. Wayne liked the idea of Wayne Waxing, with the
moon waning and waxing, and I was a drummer in another band we were in, so the
idea of Lucy being tight is a good feel. And our daughter said, "I like those
names better than your other names."

Hymn for Her collaborated with Armando y Jorge's Orlandonian
Hot Sauce Company on a hot sauce also named "Lucy & Wayne's Smokin Flames."
What are some foods your sauce tastes best on?

Lucy: Well, if you are not a vegan, it's really good on eggs
and any kind of sandwich you'd want to make. It was "the sweet" but also the
fire. Wayne says it's good on Jamaican food. Wayne puts it on his cereal.

Wait ... cereal?

Lucy: I just wanted to see if you were listening. Wayne puts in on his Fruit Loops.

I don't believe you.

Lucy: Well, you could put it in your cereal if you'd like it
extra-spicy.